


In all chaos there is a cosmos

by SapphoIsBurning



Category: NXT, World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: F/F, First Time, Very minor background Dean/Renee, lyrical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-04
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-06-21 21:34:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15566790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SapphoIsBurning/pseuds/SapphoIsBurning
Summary: Nikki can’t talk to Dakota outside the ring.Dakota can’t figure out what’s going on in Nikki’s head.Dean’s just here to help the ballclub.





	In all chaos there is a cosmos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kadma](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kadma/gifts).



> “In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.” —Carl Jung

Nikki looks at Dakota and sees: Lithe panther strength. A warrior. A warrior hidden behind layers of fear, as if fear would protect her. How beautiful it would be if she just let go? As beautiful as the stars behind her own eyelids.

Dakota looks at Nikki and sees: A warning, a dark mirror, a question? What it looks like when you have nothing left to lose and you like it.   
  
When the cameras aren’t rolling some people switch off. Dakota tries to be her best self when there are witnesses but when no one’s around she seethes, slumps, slinks and tries not to be talked to by anybody.   
  
Nikki, for her part, is only crazy in context. She can’t slap her jacket on the floor in response to the trainer ordering up a round of new workouts. She can’t act like that to Mr. Regal while they are in promo class, if she wants to still have a job at the end of the day.   
  
Neither of them smiles very much, except at each other, and even then, it’s fleeting.   
  
***

Everyone is surprised when Nikki comes out to the ring to stand up to Shayna. Including Nikki. She hates when her mind has a mind of its own. But something about Dakota being defenseless, like choking out a baby deer, and all of a sudden she is in the ring pounding the living fuck out of Shayna and someone’s ringing a bell and everyone is yelling.

Things are rough for Nikki backstage after that, and she can barely say a word about it to Dakota.

***

There are more than a few morose figures slinking around the performance center lately. Dean Ambrose is here rehabbing his arm and damn near everybody is too nervous to go talk to him, though they’re all trying not to get caught looking at him.   
  
Except Nikki.   
  
Dakota watches her just sit down next to him on a bench. She feels embarrassed but isn’t sure why. What about this is embarrassing, approaching a Famous Big Time Cool Guy or being too afraid to?   
  
And then Dakota gets mad at herself for being jealous, like why isn’t Nikki talking to her?   
  
By the time Dean is spotting Nikki for some reps Dakota’s off in the yoga room letting her bad feelings turn her into a sweaty pretzel.   


***

“Hey,” Nikki says.   
  
“Hey yourself,” Dean says.   
  
Nikki frowns. She starts to say something and then stops, huffing.   
  
“Yeah,” Dean says. “I know.”   
  
“Do you?” Nikki says, picking at her weight belt.   
  
“People moving on without you?” He asks.   
  
She nods.   
  
“Fucking sucks,” he says. He nods his head toward a weight machine and they both go over to it. “You know what made me feel better...”

“Beating the shite out of the fucking scrotes?” Nikki says through gritted teeth.

“Well, that’s always good. But, they’re not even here, are they.”

She shook her head and got down on the bench.

“Maybe keep your eyes on the prize for now?” Dean says. “There’s all kinds of hell you can put a champion through.” He says it loudly too, deliberately not looking at where Shayna is working out with a trainer. 

***

Nikki stole the fucking championship, they were all saying. She just ran off with it. Where would she even get such a crazy idea?

Dakota is...impressed. And scared, but mostly impressed. And she suspects she knows where the idea came from, and she’s sorry Nikki bothered to bring it back.

She wishes she got to see that much of her outside the ring. Might be exciting.

***

“So what’s with you and that skinny chick,” Dean says, mouth full of sandwich.

“Naught. Nothing.”

“Yuh-huh,” he says.

“What, do you think I fucking fancy her?” Nikki snaps.

“Well, I always dramatically rescue girls I don’t like at all,” he says flatly.

There’s a beat of silence between them.

“I don’t know what to say to her,” Nikki says. “She’s like...everything I’m not.”   
  
“Start with work,” Dean says. “Tell her you like her superkick.”   
  
“She could get more height on it if she tightened her—“   
  
“Nah,” Dean says. “Girls hate advice they didn’t ask for.” He frowns. “At least when it’s from dudes.”   
  
“Oh,” Nikki says. “Aren’t you giving me advice right now?”   
  
“Shit,” Dean says. “I think you got me, there. Want me to stop?”   
  
“Nah,” Nikki says, drawing out the vowel. “So I say, Dakota, I love your kicks. Wanna kick me around some time? I sound like a cunt.”   
  
“I tell you what, creepy staring ain’t any better.” Nikki takes a breath to interrupt him. “No, I seen you doin it, and it ain’t helping. Kid, I’ve been there.”   
  
“Can’t we talk about wrestling?”

“Love is wrestling, Cross.”

“You don’t make any fucking sense, you know that?”

“It’s gotten me this far.”

***

Dakota thinks about something she read in school, that everyone has a shadow and they can never access it directly, but it’s always with them. Something dark that follows them, something made entirely of desires, that only speaks to you in dreams. The things you want that you’re not allowed to want. Destruction. Oblivion.   
  
Nikki seems like a figure out of a dream sometimes, showing up to do the unthinkable. Steal the championship, like, literally run off with it. Get off on losing a match. Be dirty and weird on freaking television.

Dakota misses Ruby and thinks about calling her to ask for advice, but they didn’t part on good terms. She’s surrounded by people but still lonely. How the hell is that possible?

“Chin up, lass. Your time will come,” Mr. Regal says, patting her kindly on the shoulder as he passes.

“Oh, that, of course,” she says.

***

“You gotta snap out of this, Cross.”

Nikki punches and kicks the bag so hard she winces and pulls back.

“Let’s take five.”

“No!” She kicks the bag again and again.

“You can’t take all your bad feelings out on your body.”

“Go on and watch me.”

“Would you listen? Sometimes pain means something other than your brain is broken and...you end up on the shelf.” He rolled his shoulder and arm.   
  
“I’m already on the shelf,” she says.   
  
“You had a title match like two weeks ago, doofus, you’re not on the shelf.”

She shoves the bag at him and starts ripping the tape off her hands.   
  
“Also, when you like a girl you have to go talk to her. With words. Outside of the ring.” He inclines his head to where Dakota's stretching out her hamstring on the other side of the gym.   
  
“But...everything important happens in the ring,” Nikki says without a hint of irony.   
  
Dean just looks at her.   
  
“Who told you that.”   
  
She doesn’t answer.   
  
“I’m going to go call my wife. GO TALK TO HER.” He gestures emphatically, his eyes wide. Then he stomps off.

***

“Hey,” Nikki says.   
  
“Uh, hi,” Dakota says.   
  
Nikki stands there with her mouth open, like she’s trying to get something out. She closes it. “Dakota,” she says.   
  
Dakota smiles a little.   
  
“That’s a pretty name,” Nikki says with a burr. Then: “I have to go.”   
  
“Wait,” Dakota says.   
  
Nikki freezes awkwardly.   
  
“I never got to thank you,” she says, tucking a stray curl behind her ear.   
  
“Oh,” Nikki says, swaying back and forth and circling her right thumb and finger around her left wrist, writhing.   
  
“You’re everything I’m not allowed to want,” Dakota says.   
  
Nikki blinks. “Says who?”   
  
They stare at each other for a moment before Dakota breaks into giggles and then Nikki follows, laughing and gasping and stumbling into each other, arms clutching.   
  
“You can want whatever you fucking want, angel,” Nikki says. “You bonnie angel. Fucking dammit, you’re so beautiful.”   
  
And then Dakota kisses her—and they both see stars.

They each look behind themselves, reflexively, like the boogeyman or woman might jump out at them, or someone might see them, god forbid, expressing sincere emotions.   
  
The only person looking is Dean, and he’s pretending not to.   
  
“He’s okay,” Nikki says, rolling her eyes. “He gives good advice.”   
  
“Really?” Dakota asks. “For instance?”   
  
“‘Go talk to her,” Nikki says in her best impression of his midwestern drawl.   
  
Dakota blinks a few times. “Wanna get out of here?”   
  
Nikki’s eyebrows shoot up and she bounces up and down on the balls of her feet, breathing fast. She nods, eyes wide.   
  
They make a quick exit.   
  
***   
  
“I like your superkick,” Nikki says. They’re walking aimlessly toward Dakota’s apartment.   
  
“Thanks,” she says.   
  
Nikki bites her lip and keeps walking, looking at her feet.   
  
“What.”   
  
“Nothing.”   
  
“You don’t sound done.”   
  
“Do you want advice?” Nikki says.   
  
Dakota laughs. “Oh,” she says. “Were you going to tell me I could get better height on it if I...”   
  
“Oh,” Nikki says.   
  
“I get that a lot,” Dakota says, her mouth round drawing out the vowel. “If only you tightened your glutes more, if you did more labrum work, if you sat on my face...”   
  
“I don’t know how that last one would help,” Nikki says quickly. “People are so weird.”   
  
Dakota sighs. “They are really weird, you are right.”   
  
***   
  
Nikki enters Dakota’s apartment like a wild animal caught in an office building and not sure how to get out.   
  
“Do you want something to drink?” Dakota asks.   
  
“I don’t know,” Nikki says. She can’t figure out whether to take her shoes off or not, and the couch is white. White!    
  
“Sit down,” Dakota says. She thumbs her phone and some music starts playing, something soft and pink sounding.   
  
“I’m going to leave a manky arse-print on the couch and then you won’t talk to me anymore, I’ll stand,” Nikki says.   
  
Dakota hands her a bottle of water, and runs a hand through her hair, tracing fingers down the side of her face. Nikki shivers.   
  
“Relax,” Dakota says. “I don’t bite. Much.”   
  
Nikki stares and then softens. “You can bite if you want,” she says. “I’ve had worse.”   
  
Dakota rolls her eyes and drags Nikki toward the white couch. She pulls them both down and it’s like sitting on a picture of a cloud, like Nikki ought to look up to see the sun drawn in the corner of the living room.   
  
“I like to be close to danger,” Dakota says thoughtfully, “but when it touches me, I run away.”   
  
Nikki puts her hand on top of Dakota’s. “You’re nae running now.”   
  
“Personal growth,” Dakota says.   
  
Nikki links their fingers together and brings Dakota’s hand to her lips for a kiss. She glances up, meeting Dakota’s eyes. “How am I doing.”   
  
“Pretty good,” Dakota nods.   
  
Nikki extends the kisses up Dakota’s arm, nuzzling her wrist and then biting it, gently, all the way up her arm, shoulder, to her neck.   
  
“Still good?” she asks.   
  
“Still good,” Dakota laughs.   
  
Nikki kisses her neck and pulls their bodies closer together, letting herself feel her desire fully. It is right and just to want to kiss a beautiful girl who is telling you to keep going, that she loves danger too.   
  
Their lips meet and the wanting pours from them, giving them something to do with their hands, an easy dance they learned the moves to a long time ago, a move you can’t botch, touching and being touched.   
  
***   
  
Nikki glides her thumbs over Dakota’s dark, tight nipples. “My angel, lay down for me.”   
  
Dakota leans back into a pile of pillows and Nikki takes in the full sight of her. She twitches and shudders for a sec, almost unable to take her all in.   
  
They join together like light and darkness, like madness and calm spiraling into beauty, a wave breaking over a rocky shore, making love that is warm, vast, sweet, and surprisingly loud.   
  
Dakota comes like she’s holding in a sneeze, thrashing silently and turning red. Nikki curses loud and hard until Dakota is laughing and catching her breath and they are both sticky and inseparable.   
  
“Do you believe in fate?” Dakota asks.   
  
“Nae,” Nikki drawls. “Too easy. Make your own fate.” She draws circles in circles on Dakota’s back with her finger tips.   
  
“Like that,” Dakota breathes. “Just like that.”  
  


 

 


End file.
